


who would've thought i'd get you?

by blindfolds



Series: who would've thought i'd get you? [2]
Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Fluff, Happy Ending, M/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-04
Updated: 2019-03-04
Packaged: 2019-11-09 00:57:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17991806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blindfolds/pseuds/blindfolds
Summary: han jisung never stops falling in love. always the same person, always the same feeling. over and over and over, for the rest of his life.





	who would've thought i'd get you?

it doesn’t take han jisung very long to fall in love. he had always known who it was going to be, after all. he just hadn’t known when. 

the first time he sees lee minho, lee minho doesn’t see him. instead, said boy is leaning against his locker, surrounded by a group of pretty teenagers that have clearly chosen him as their designated leader. from across the hall, he can make out the voice of a boy he’s familiar with, chan from physics, tell minho that he is definitely going to make it into seoul uni. another boy with the biggest doe eyes he’s ever seen says that seoul uni doesn’t even deserve somebody like minho, he’s just too good for them. 

the way minho bashfully smiles back at the group of boys, shaking his head as he zips his backpack shut, is so perfectly humble and gentle and kind that it sends jisung into cardiac arrest. he can’t tear his eyes away, not even when hwang hyunjin tugs at the sleeve of his sweatshirt, making a face at jisung’s evidently lovestruck expression. 

“you don’t have a chance with a senior like minho, you know that, right?” hyunjin laughs, stepping in front of jisung and blocking his view of the older boy. 

“thanks.”

“i’m just being realistic, ji.”

“and i’m just looking, hyunjin.”

hyunjin just raises an eyebrow, and they don’t talk about lee minho again after that.

sometimes, jisung is glad that he only has one friend. it isn’t as if he needs more than one, like there’s some gaping void in his life that pains him day after day. he’s a high school junior. there’s already so much going on in his brain that he only has room for hyunjin anyways. 

after the fateful Lee Minho Sighting, however, jisung wishes he had somebody else to talk to-- somebody that isn’t hyunjin. he doesn’t know how to tell hyunjin that he writes songs about minho’s delicate button-downs and cashmere sweaters, the papers always covered with red ink and always found crumpled up at the bottom of his trash can. if he did, hyunjin would only tell him that minho is far, far out of the league of a pale, awkward junior that dresses solely in ratty sweatshirts and ripped jeans. 

and so, when minho’s eyes brush over him in the hallways, he has nobody to tell. jisung has nobody to share the ethereal being that is minho with. it’s then, and only then, that he looks in the mirror and asks the universe to help him out just this once.

‘dear universe,  
i would really appreciate if you could have minho say hi to me tomorrow. i know that he’s too cute for me, but it’d still be great. in fact, i’d even be okay if he just touched me. or the air around me. you know what, just have him within five feet of me and i promise i’ll stop asking for stuff. thanks.

yours sincerely,  
han jisung’

the next year, minho goes off to college and high school just doesn’t seem so meaningful anymore. 

jisung can no longer fantasize about the elder confessing to him in front of everybody he knows, a blinding smile on his face as he gets down on one knee and everybody claps and cheers. never mind that minho has never said a word to him, much less implied that he knows who jisung is. the younger was satisfied with the mere promise of seeing minho and his off-kilter smile every day-- and if he was lucky, in his dreams as well. 

but now, minho is gone, and the younger has nothing to daydream about in the middle of ap economics. instead, jisung throws himself deeper into songwriting, into rapping, locking himself in his room and closing the blinds so he can focus on what’s important. he can barely believe he let a stupid guy, no matter how perfect, completely derail his plans for the future. 

occasionally, when jisung’s self-discipline is particularly weak, he’ll pull out his phone and let himself land on minho’s instagram. it’s a sadistic habit, but it’s one that’s hard to break. 

he had promised himself that after minho left, he’d get over his stupid infatuation. maybe then he could make some new friends, buy some actual clothes, and stop killing his hair with copious amounts of hair dye. (which was something he only started doing to get minho’s attention, by the way. he went from blue to purple to silver in the span of four months, yet minho continued to walk past him as if he was a wall and not a living, breathing human being.)

scrolling through the elder’s feed, a very faint voice in his head tells him how pathetic his life is compared to minho’s. a shot of the elder sitting in a café, face framed by pink and yellow honeysuckle as he sips on a cappuccino, takes him back to junior year again. in the moment, he wishes he was more like woojin, or seungmin, or any one of minho’s exceedingly gorgeous friends. 

you see, jisung was content with his life the way it is. he’s probably spent twelve of his eighteen years of life inside, back hunched over a notepad as he fiddles with the keys of a piano in an attempt to create something resembling music. he liked it like that. he liked people not knowing who he was, and the people that did know him letting him be alone. 

but minho, minho lives every day outside with somebody new, so well-liked and funny and kind in the way only minho can be. he can’t help but wonder if he’s doing something wrong. he tends to walk around like he’s mad at the world, sure. he doesn’t actually like coffee, and he doesn’t go anywhere without his earbuds blaring music at full volume. he lets hyunjin give him stick and poke tattoos in his bathroom at three in the morning. none of this used to bother him, and now it does. 

jisung forces himself to switch off his phone by the time he gets to a video of minho lounging by the ocean, head resting on the stomach of another old senior from high school he recognizes. (changbin, chanhee, maybe? he would definitely remember a face like that.)

after this lapse in his self-control, the rest of jisung’s senior year passes by relatively peacefully. he manages to make one other friend, felix lee, who happens to ask hyunjin on a date and is subsequently roped into their dysfunctional friendship. he even buys new clothes, letting the two lovebirds dress him in actual colors, not just the black and navy blue he has spent his entire life wearing. the only part of his plan that he doesn’t actually succeed in is letting his natural hair grow out, soft and wavy and dark brown. instead, he chooses purple and sticks to it, lips curling into a smile whenever he notices a stranger staring at it for a second too long. even if minho never noticed his hair, at least somebody does. 

in fact, jisung doesn’t check minho’s instagram at all anymore. he doesn’t think about how minho used to angle his paper to the side so other people can copy his tests, or how he always stops to donate to the leadership’s classes constant fundraisers. slowly, but surely, he forgets about the elder’s tendency to blink the fringe of his bangs out of his eyes, and how his fingernails, short and clean, are always painted over with a clear coat of nail polish. 

jisung forgets about it all until his acceptance to seoul uni comes in the mail. all of a sudden, he remembers the first time he saw minho in that hallway, the prettiest boy out of all the pretty boys he was surrounded by. he thinks about his radiant smile, and time stops all over again. 

“you’re definitely going to get into seoul uni, minho.”

this is his chance.

* * *

jisung doesn’t think twice before he accepts seoul uni’s offer, hands trembling as he tells his mom and dad that yes, he’s going to college! no, this isn’t a joke!

felix and hyunjin, meanwhile, exchange knowing glances when jisung breaks the news to them. they’re ecstatic nonetheless, and that night is spent demolishing two pizzas as some rap song blasts in the background. jisung had always planned on going to college with hyunjin, just the two of them as it had always been, but things had a funny way of working out. now, felix and hyunjin plan to go to america-- new york, specifically. dance majors, the two of them. he couldn’t have been more proud. 

jisung does his best to prepare for it, but the day he says goodbye to hyunjin in the airport, he can’t help the tears that spill down his cheeks and leave a stain on hyunjin’s sweatshirt. felix stands awkwardly to the side, eyes cast downwards as jisung pulls away from the last hug he’d share with his best friend for a while. 

“good luck, okay?” hyunjin laughs, swiping at a stray tear on jisung’s cheek. 

jisung manages to pull himself together, smiling back as he swallows back the lump in his throat. 

“i will. you too, yeah?”

“yeah.” hyunjin says, and the crack in his voice betrays his happy expression. 

he’s about to turn around before he leans in to whisper something into jisung’s ear, felix hovering over his shoulder. 

“make sure you don’t miss out this time, okay? you should at least try to talk to him. you never know.”

jisung steps back as if he’s been burned, cheeks aflame with embarrassment. he’s barely able to stutter out an ‘i don’t know what you’re talking about!’ before hyunjin and felix disappear in the sea of travelers, the dull roar of the airport drowning out his embarrassed protests. 

on the way home, jisung contemplates what hyunjin told him. seoul uni was the best offer he had received, and it was just cheap enough so that he wouldn’t have to graduate drowning in student loans. they had an excellent music production program, and he probably would have met a lot of people just like him. but he would probably see minho again, and subconsciously, jisung knows that minho was the final thing he needed to convince him to go to seoul. he wasn’t a stalker by any means, but he had always been a little hopeful. minho was just an opportunity to prove to himself that he had actually changed over the course of a year. that was all. 

it doesn’t take han jisung very long to fall in love the second time around. he had always known it was going to happen, after all. he just hadn’t known when. 

when he sees lee minho at seoul university, it feels like the first time for the second time. except now, minho isn’t leaning against a locker or swarmed by a group of second-rate knockoff minhos. this time, he’s ordering a cappuccino, alone, and he tells the cashier to keep the change in typical minho fashion and oh no, jisung is not over it. he never was, and judging by the way he can barely form coherent thoughts at the sight of him, he probably never will be. 

jisung feels like an embarrassing junior again, not a freshman in college. suddenly, he’s hyper-aware of his worn out black hoodie and the gray tinge to his white vans and the faded tips of his purple hair. minho is wearing a fucking dress coat and SLACKS and a beret. minho looks like he stepped out of a runway show in paris, and jisung looks like an angsty teen that has spent too much time sleeping and not enough time in the sun. 

the first words minho speaks to him him are nothing like what jisung imagined-- but still perfect all the same.

“oh god, i’m so sorry! it’s all my fault.” minho apologizes, pulling at a fistful of napkins as he watches what was once his cappuccino drip down the front of jisung’s sweatshirt. 

“i-”

“please, let me pay for your drink. no, you know what, let me pay for a new sweatshirt AND another drink!” minho babbles, futilely attempting to rub out the splotches of coffee on jisung’s chest. the younger’s silence is deafening, and minho awkwardly laughs and steps back. jisung doesn’t miss the blush on the elder’s cheeks, his hands buried deep in the pockets of his dress coat as his embarrassed words catch in his throat. 

“it’s not a big deal. my sweatshirt’s black, anyways. you’re fine.” sure, it feels like his skin is peeling off and disintegrating underneath the fabric, but minho has never done anything wrong in his life. ever. he could stab jisung in the chest repeatedly and the younger boy would thank him. truthfully, jisung is more surprised at how cool he sounds than his ability to respond to minho without melting into a puddle on the ground. the other boy seems equally surprised, eyebrows raising in sync with the corner of his lips. 

“okay, so you don’t need another sweatshirt. you should probably let me pay for your drink, though. it’s the least i could do.” 

“yeah, sure. you should probably buy yourself another one too, you know, considering your first one is basically mine now.” jisung has to stop speaking to take a deep breath and compose himself. he’s doing it, he really is, and it isn’t the fantastical experience he thought it would be. no, this time jisung can actually be funny and interesting and nice, and minho is so perfectly normal that jisung actually thinks he has a chance. he can’t believe his luck. 

minho actually laughs out loud this time, loud enough to attract nasty glances from other sleep-deprived college students. he steps backwards to order another drink, but not before commenting on jisung’s hair.

“i like the purple, by the way. i’ve never seen anybody with hair that color before.”

jisung is grateful that minho chooses that moment to turn his back to him, because if he hadn’t, he would’ve seen the younger’s knees buckle with the sheer force of his words. 

minho likes his hair. it’s nothing big, really, it’s just a polite offhand comment to make up for spilling coffee on him. but he notices his hair, and that’s enough for jisung. 

the elder boy spots jisung sitting at a table by the window, fingers running over the pink and yellow honeysuckle that trail up the wall of the cafe. minho takes a moment to watch the sun light up jisung’s eyes, casting shadows across the bridge of his nose and the slope of his jaw. jisung isn’t looking at him, but he is certainly looking at jisung. 

when minho walks over, he seems significantly less flustered than before. he takes a seat across from the younger, taking a long drag of his coffee as he does. jisung just knows it’s scalding but of course, simple things like burning your mouth on coffee don’t happen to lee minho. 

“i’ve never seen you around before...” 

“jisung. my name is jisung.” 

“i’ve never seen you around before, jisung.” minho gives him a crooked smile, setting his coffee down on the table between them. 

“i’m a freshman, actually. i just got here.” 

“oh, really?” the elder’s eyes narrow with recognition, and he looks like he wants to say something. instead, he presses his lips into a firm line and sits back in his seat. when he brushes the fringe of his bangs out of his eyes, jisung’s heart skips a beat. 

“we went to the same high school, minho.” jisung laughs, practically reading his mind. his stomach does backflips at the idea that minho actually remembers his face, and he keeps his hands from shaking by tightening his grip on his hot chocolate.

“you know my name?” 

oh. fuck. minho is going to realize that jisung was that person in high school, the one that just watched and listened to the ‘populars’ like a fucking loser, and the two of them were going to lose whatever good thing they had going on right now. but he had already done the damage, and there was no point in lying. he could never lie to minho. 

“i think everybody in high school knew your name,” he teases, “you’d be pretty hard to miss.”

at this, the tips of minho’s ears go red. 

(and jisung is starting to feel prettyyyy good about himself.)

“hello?”

“w-what?” jisung stutters, eyes snapping up to meet the elder’s. he realizes he has probably spent an uncomfortable amount of time staring at minho’s hands wrapped around his coffee.

“oh, i’m sorry,” minho scoots his chair backwards, “i was just saying that i have to go now, but it was very nice meeting you. and i’m sorry about the whole spilling my coffee on you and probably giving you third degree burns thing.”

“don’t worry about it-- you paid for my drink, so we’re basically even.”

“i’ll see you around, yeah?” minho hurriedly checks the time on his phone, and jisung suddenly feels guilty for keeping him in the cafe for so long. 

“yeah. see you.”

* * *

college ends up not being all too different from high school. jisung is evidently stuck with the only-one-friend curse, and it’s sad but a comforting reminder that some things never change. this time, it ends up being yang jeongin, some kind of genius that graduated high school early and came to seoul uni to double major in mechanical engineering and french. jisung still facetimes hyunjin and felix regularly, and they do their best to fit as much of the important stuff into the bits and pieces of time they have to speak to each other. when jisung tells them about meeting minho, they’re so excited that jisung has to tell them to be quiet. 

“i don’t think you understand, jisung. the odds of you meeting minho within a month of getting to college is practically unheard of. like, thousands of kids go there. thousands.” felix says reverently, face obnoxiously close to the camera.

“not to mention he paid for your drink and sat with you. it’s like the universe has fated the two of you to be together.” hyunjin chimes in from off-screen. 

“that happened, like, three months ago. it’s december and we haven’t seen each other since. the universe is doing a pretty bad job of this whole fated to be together thing.” 

“jisung, you’re such a pessimist. if you’ve managed to have a crush on a guy for two and a half years with essentially no interactions, then you can wait a little longer. the universe works in mysterious ways.” 

“yeah, sure. let me suddenly become good enough for minho and then we’ll talk.” jisung rolls his eyes and shoves another bite of rice down his throat, glancing over at the clock. “i-”

“hey, wouldn’t it totally suck if you got to know minho and he’s actually this total asshole? like, just the biggest dick ever?” hyunjin ponders, scooting into the frame of the camera. 

“yeah, that’s my cue to leave. bye guys, i’ll talk to you later.” 

right before jisung hangs up, he can hear hyunjin give felix a quiet kiss and it makes his heart squeeze. he spends the rest of the day suspended in a bittersweet melancholy, wondering if he will ever be kissed in california as the sun shines on his skin. in fact, he’d settle for being kissed in seoul as the rain soaks him to the bone. 

the universe manages to do a better job at the whole ‘fated to be together thing’ exactly one week after jisung’s facetime call. 

he’s writing down a chord when he hears two gentle knocks on the door of his studio, jumping in his seat as they echo off the walls of the silent room.

“jeongin-ah, i’m busy right now. this is due tomorrow, and we can go get food another day, okay?”

“it’s me, actually.”

oh god, this is definitely not happening. it’s impossible. jisung is dreaming, and by the time he wakes up, minho will not be standing in the doorway of the music production department’s studio.

when he swivels around in his chair, he is suddenly aware that no, this is not a dream, and he should probably start talking now.

“minho…?” 

clearly, jisung’s off to a rather strong start.

“yeah, i’m really sorry if this is weird, and several months late, but i have the new sweatshirt i promised you.” minho gives him a hopeful smile, holding up a shopping bag with ‘vetements’ clearly printed on it. “i know you said you didn’t need one, but i saw you a couple weeks ago and you were wearing the coffee sweatshirt and…”

“oh.” jisung’s cheeks flush with embarrassment, and his eyes flicker downwards to his chest for a split second before he stares back at minho. of course, he would be wearing the coffee sweatshirt the day minho happens to show up to his studio. the elder probably thinks he’s a mess with only one set of clothes, and he wouldn’t even be all that far off from the truth. 

“i… will just leave this here.” minho steps into the studio and leaves the bag next to jisung’s notebook. 

“you really don’t have to. those sweatshirts are, like, a thousand dollars, and i have other clothes. at, uh, home.” 

“i’m sure you do,” minho struggles to hold back his laughter, purposefully staring at the coffee stain on jisung’s chest, “but i can afford it so how about you just take the sweatshirt as a gift from me and not as payback for anything, okay?”

“okay.” jisung says tentatively, leaning back in his chair and hoping he looks as relaxed as he’s pretending to be. he looks at the bag like it’s a ticking time bomb. “thank you.”

“it’s no problem.” 

for a second, it’s completely silent, and only then does jisung really see minho for who he is. just a korean college student, cute and funny and smart. just a boy that’s one year older than him and yet so much farther away. but he’s standing pretty close to jisung right now, so close that jisung could map out every mole and freckle dotting minho’s face if he wanted to. 

“how’d you find me anyways?” jisung asks, eyebrows raised. the question seems to catch minho off-guard, and he nervously fiddles with the ends of his scarf. it’s a new thing for jisung-- seeing minho anything less than absolutely confident. 

“i asked your friend, jeong-something, and found out you were a music production major, so i came here and found out when you were scheduled to use the studio. and the rest, i guess, is pretty obvious.”

“that’s a lot of effort for just one sweatshirt.”

“it’s more than just one sweatshirt, you know.” as soon as he finishes his sentence, minho begins to bounce from leg to leg, chewing at the inside of his lip.

“oh, really? what else?” 

“i was also going to ask you if you would help me dye my hair.”

jisung’s world suddenly stops turning. he has spent forever spinning around minho’s axis, but now, he has the opportunity to pull him into his orbit.

so he does.

* * *

jisung tells minho he would have to think about it. why he says that, he doesn’t really know. he knows he’s going to end up saying yes one way or another, but he needed at least five hours to scream and laugh and cry and call hyunjin before he would be able to tell minho ‘yes’ without his heart beating out of his chest. 

minho had given him his number before he left the studio, telling him to take as much time as he needs and that he shouldn’t feel any pressure to help him. it’s nearly midnight when jisung sends him a text agreeing to dye his hair, but minho still responds in less than ten seconds. his indulgent use of exclamation marks and heart emojis would typically annoy jisung, but the younger is so far gone that it hardly bothers him-- all he can think about are his hands running through minho’s hair, which would probably feel like feathers and flowers and sunshine itself. 

that night, he dreams not of minho, but of himself in junior year, sketching the waves of minho’s soft brown hair in his ap chem notebook and throwing the paper away at the end of class. 

they go shopping together the day after. 

“what do you think? silver or blue?” minho asks, loud enough so that the entire store could probably give him a response. he holds the two boxes of dye up to his hair, eyes carefully watching jisung’s expression. 

jisung pretends to think, but he knows the answer as soon as minho asks the question.

“i think silver would suit you more, but blue would be fine.” 

minho purses his lips in contemplation, oblivious to the way jisung is currently committing every single strand of his hair to memory. instead, he sets the box of silver hair dye back on the shelf, making a quiet noise of discontent.

“silver would probably be too much on me, don’t you think?” he turns to face jisung, head tilted to the side. 

“no, not at all. i think you would look beautiful with silver hair.” 

minho makes a strangled noise of both surprise and satisfaction-- the way his face lights up directly contradicts the way he shakes his head at jisung’s compliment. 

jesus. if this is how he reacts to being called beautiful, jisung would never be able to show him any of the songs he inspired. the idea of minho not knowing how absolutely flawless he is makes the younger more angry than he thought it would, and jisung decides to take it upon himself and make sure minho knows he is nothing less than perfect. 

minho ends up buying the silver hair dye in the end, much to jisung’s pleasure. they walk back to campus as slowly as they can under a blanket of seoul snow, surrounded by the faint rumble of speeding cars and the smell of greasy street food. jisung is wearing the vetements sweatshirt, and when minho notices, his body floods with a warmth he has never felt before. not in seoul, not at school, and especially not with any of his friends. 

once, when jisung isn’t looking, minho takes a picture of him as he walks a few steps ahead, hood pulled up over his hair. 

the next time he tries to take a picture, jisung catches him just as he’s putting his phone away. the younger clicks his tongue with disapproval, and tells minho that he should be the one in front of the camera, not jisung. the elder protests as much as he can, but jisung manages to get a blurry shot of minho laughing as he crosses the street, snow collecting on his soon-to-be silver hair. 

along the way, minho spots a stand selling lamb skewers and decides he just can’t go on if he doesn’t eat right at that moment. naturally, jisung, being the gentleman that he is, offers to pay. minho takes the opportunity to snap another picture, ducking out of jisung’s reach when the younger reaches out to smack his hand away. 

“why me?” jisung asks when he gets the food, handing minho one of the skewers. the steaming food warms him from the inside out, and he takes an impatient bite before he starts walking next to the elder.

“huh?”

“you know, why’d you ask me to dye your hair? i mean this as nicely as possible, but we weren’t even… you know.”

“i know we weren’t friends, but you were the only person i knew that had dyed hair.” minho shrugs as he licks his fingers clean, swallowing down the biggest bite of food jisung has ever seen somebody take. 

“so that’s the only reason you asked a complete stranger to help you?” jisung frowns. 

“are you being serious?” minho giggles. his entire body vibrates with the effort of holding back his laughter, and jisung suddenly feels very, very out of the loop. 

“yes?” it’s more of a question than an answer, but jisung is too flustered to respond properly. 

“jisung, i asked you for help because i wanted to hang out with you more. i thought you were cool and nice and different, so when i saw you wearing the old hoodie i just took the opportunity to be your friend. i don’t spend a thousand dollars on just anybody, you know.”

“oh.” jisung says dumbly. to avoid having to answer, he takes another bite of his food and chews at half the speed he normally does. if minho notices anything is off, he doesn’t show it-- he just keeps going.

“i mean, if you don’t want to hang out with me, you don’t have to. i know that i’m probably not the type of person you’d like, anyways.” minho says this with confidence, but his disappointed expression doesn’t escape jisung. 

oh, please. if only minho knew. 

“of course i want to hang out-- i just thought we were too different to be friends in the first place.”

“we’re more similar than you think, you know. and even if we weren’t, we could teach each other new things. am i right?”

“yeah, minho. you’re right.”

* * *

jisung barely remembers actually getting to dye minho’s hair because of how unreal it all feels. they spend hours leaning over minho’s bathtub, the elder complaining as jisung methodically coats each section of his hair in the silver goop. after they finish, minho is so jittery that he orders them celebratory ramen, calling it a special occasion that deserves only the finest of foods. the two of them race to see who can finish their food first, a competition minho is sure he can win. it turns out jisung is able to stuff a surprising amount of food in his cheeks, and minho ends up spending too much time laughing at the way the younger’s face puffs up to actually eat his own food. they agreed before that as a punishment, the winner would get to post whatever he wanted on the loser’s instagram. positively delighted, jisung chooses the blurry picture of minho he took as they crossed the street, and when minho looks at his choice, he groans and asks jisung to delete it. 

“first of all, my face is all puffy and dry. second of all, my eyes are basically shut, and third of all, only one half of my mouth is actually smiling.” minho grumbles, getting up to put their dishes away.

“you look beautiful.”

“whatever you say, ji.”

if jisung thought minho was beautiful in the picture, it’s nothing compared to what he looks like when his hair is officially silver. he looks like a prince. it’s unfair, really, for one person to be so unimaginably perfect. minho could have dyed his hair highlighter yellow and still have taken jisung’s breath away.

for the first few days afterwards, minho hides his hair under a hat. when jisung asks him about it, minho brushes him off and tells him that he’s just cold. jisung knows better at this point. he wishes the elder knew how radiant he was.

the first time jisung sees minho actually show it to other people, he’s with jeongin.

“obsessed much?”

“what?”

“stop staring at minho. it’s creepy.”

“i’m not staring!”

“we are at one end of the library. minho is at the other end. you have been watching him for about five minutes now, so yeah, you’re staring. if you’re so in love with him just tell him already, dumbass.” jeongin rolls his eyes and turns back to his work, scrawling in a notebook labeled ‘i never should have double majored’. 

jisung thinks it over for a second. ever since he dyed minho’s hair, they’ve been texting pretty consistently. minho sends him pretty pictures of him in local restaurants, dressed in luxurious clothes and sitting by the side of some pretty college boy. jisung, meanwhile, sends him pictures half-asleep as he writes songs at ungodly hours of the night. last night, the elder offered to have jisung stay at his apartment so he could relax and get some actual rest, not just fitful sleep after falling asleep at his desk. he turned minho down, of course, but the idea of confessing burns in the back of his mind like a sting that won’t go away. 

jeongin’s right, of course. he needs to confess before he loses his grip on minho and the elder spins into somebody else’s world. i’ll tell him, jisung promises himself. one day.]

* * *

they spend more and more time together. every time minho hands jisung a hot chocolate, half whipped cream and half milk, it’s overwhelming and perfectly routine all at once. they spend hours arguing over tv shows, ordering unhealthy amounts of pizza, and walking along the han river. minho buys jisung more clothes, each ‘gift’ more extravagant than the last. jisung continues to write and write and write, and the pile of songs he’s began to call ‘minho’s music’ grows larger and larger as every day passes. every time minho has to leave one of their hangouts because some knock-off minho texts him with an emergency, he makes sure to leave behind a scarf or glove or twenty-dollar bill that jisung just has to return the next day. 

it’s better than anything jisung could have imagined-- it’s better than anything he deserves. he thinks about how much time minho, who is well-known and well-liked, spends time with jisung, who is not well-known or well-liked. it seems like the universe is lulling him into a false sense of security, because everything is just going so well that it all has to be some cruel prank meant to put him in his place. 

every time minho shows up to the cafe, he’s reminded that this is real. and yes, it is entirely possible that minho likes somebody like him. even if he doesn’t believe it just yet.

even so, jisung doesn’t really know what the two of them are. minho texts him and buys him things like a boyfriend would, true. but he has plenty of other people he could be interested in, not to mention the possibility that jisung just isn’t his type. but then again, he takes pictures of jisung and feeds him the way a boyfriend would. but he still has to consider the fact that minho hasn’t introduced him to his other friends, or initiated any physical contact that goes past brushing shoulders and gently nudging each other when one of them needs to hurry up.

it isn’t important to jisung either way. the jisung from junior year couldn’t have imagined a time when he’d be friends with the enigma that is lee minho. he can’t lose something he’s never had, after all.

it doesn’t take han jisung very long to fall in love the third time around. this time, he wasn’t sure it was going to happen. he hadn’t known when. 

the first sign that something is off is the noise of somebody knocking on jisung’s door at two in the morning. jisung, with a shoe in one hand, opens the door as slowly as he can and is promptly confronted with the heavy breathing of a sweaty lee minho, of all people. he lets out a sigh of relief and invites minho inside, cheeks flushed red with the way he had his shoe raised in the air. 

the second sign that something is off is the fact that minho is the one at the door. it would’ve been entirely normal for his roommate, or maybe even jeongin, to be standing outside of the door. but his roommate was off doing god-knows-what for the night, and jeongin would never risk his academic capabilities by staying up past eleven. which means the only person it could’ve been was minho, but even then, jisung is suspicious. 

“you okay, minho? what’s wrong?” jisung pours minho a glass of water and studies the elder’s tense expression. 

the third sign that something is off is definitely the way minho is wearing sweats and a t-shirt. despite the fact that they’ve probably spent a combined month together, jisung has never seen minho wear sweats. he didn’t even think minho owned sweats.

“am i doing something wrong?” 

“w-what?”

“am. i. doing. something. wrong? i don’t get it, jisung.” minho’s voice is shaky and strained, and when jisung tries to approach him, he steps back. 

“i’m going to need more information, minho.”

“i have literally spent the past five months trying to date you, jisung. like hold your hand or kiss you or breathe the same air as you. for five months. do you understand the patience i needed for that? and i don’t get it. am i doing something wrong? are you blind?” 

“what the fuck? why would you want to date me?” jisung cringes as soon as he says it, but it’s the first thought that comes to mind. never mind that all of his high school dreams are culminating into something far better than he could have invented. never mind that the object of his affections for three years is confessing his love for him, the way they do in the movies. never mind that his world has been shifted off of its axis, free-falling in space and sending him light years away.

minho likes him, and jisung isn’t even sure why. 

minho looks as if he’s going to burst. jisung has truly never seen him so frustrated, not even back in high school. it’s terrifying, if not a little attractive. (but now is not the time, and jisung knows that.) 

“seriously? jisung, i just confessed to being in love with you and that’s your first response?”

“yeah, yeah, i like you back, minho,” the words feel strange as they roll off of jisung’s tongue, “but it-- i--” 

“you ask for your hot chocolate to be half whipped cream.”

“what?”

“you’re asking me why i like you, aren’t you? so shut up and listen, please.” minho is more confident now, the ghost of a smile pulling at the corner of his lips. jisung likes him. he likes jisung, and jisung likes him, and everything is right with the world.

“oh. okay.”

“when we study together, you make these paws with your sweatshirt and cup your face with them. sometimes, when we watch a movie, you steal my food and you think i don’t notice, but i do. i buy you clothes and you make sure to wear them the next day. you have a really cute nose.”

“my nose?” 

“yeah, jisung, your nose. the rest of you is very cute too, though, so don’t worry.”

they spend a moment just staring at each other, frozen in place. 

when they finally kiss, it’s awkward and messy the way jisung hoped it wouldn’t be back in high school. but it’s perfect now, with minho’s hands firmly on his waist and the other one wrapped tightly in his hair. jisung feels like he can’t breathe, like he’s going to collapse, but he remembers he has minho to hold him up so he keeps his eyes shut tight and keeps going.

they kiss for what’s probably close to five hours. somewhere along the way, minho smacks his hip into his kitchen counter, and jisung nearly draws blood from how hard he bites down on the elder’s lip, but they keep going. it’s jisung’s first kiss, after all. minho wants to make it worth it.

* * *

one year later, minho still kisses jisung like he wants to make it worth it. it’s always warm and soft and their lips always taste like home. when they pull away, jisung makes sure to fix minho’s jacket for him, ensuring there isn’t a single hair out of place as they compose themselves. now, when jisung checks minho’s instagram, he’s in every picture posted. the first picture is a shot of them sitting together in the cafe where they first met, pink and yellow honeysuckle framing their happy faces.

two years later, jisung begins to drink coffee. he still finds it disgusting, but minho is so busy with his last year of college that the only time they get together seems to be over one of the elder’s cappuccinos. surprisingly enough, he learns that it does a much better job than hot chocolate when it comes to keeping him awake in the studio. if he’s lucky, minho will join him at three in the morning with lamb skewers and some chocolate, his ever-radiant smile plastered across his face as jisung plays the piano for him.

three years later, minho goes from a job in seoul teaching young kids the basics of dance to a job at jyp teaching trainees choreography that goes over his head sometimes. jisung struggles with finishing his graduation project, and minho’s heart aches when he feels his boyfriend sob in his arms, too stressed out to sleep but too tired to stay awake. one day, jisung goes into the studio wearing the first vetements sweatshirt the elder ever bought him, and he leaves with a finished graduation project ready to hand into his professor. that night, they celebrate. 

four years later, the two of them wear matching silver bands on their left ring finger. minho had proposed by han river, and after a five-minute long argument over how expensive the rings must have been, jisung had said yes and sobbed for about two hours after that. he still can’t believe it-- he stares at the ring every spare moment he gets, heartbeat speeding up when he thinks about what it means. he’s going to spend the rest of his life with lee minho. the lee minho. the one that angles his test to the side so other people can copy and always stops to donate to the leadership’s class constant fundraisers.

five years later, it’s official. ‘you’re stuck with me forever now, you know that, right?’ minho teases, pressing a kiss to jisung’s temple. ‘not necessarily. i could always divorce you.’ jisung snaps back. that clearly doesn’t sit well with minho, because he spends the rest of night attached to the younger’s hip, reminding him that they are truly and fully stuck together forever. jisung wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. 

ten years later, life is as perfect as it was when they first kissed in jisung’s dorm room. minho still dresses like a runway model, and no matter how many clothes minho buys him, jisung still has the wardrobe of an angsty high school junior. jisung manages to make a name for himself in the music industry, and minho has already won numerous awards for his choreography. they kiss like they want it to be worth it, every single time. 

jisung falls in love over and over and over. every time, it’s the same person. every time, it feels like the first.

**Author's Note:**

> special thanks to julie ❤️


End file.
